| |
Previous News
JUNE
2004
06.23.04
* Here is a rumor that
someone passed on to me and I have not yet seen
announced anywhere, regarding the King Kong
remake (motion-cap/computer animated) to be helmed by
LOTR fame Director, Peter Jackson. We know that LOTR
Academy Award Winner & former Stop Motionist,
Randall W. Cook will not be
involved with Kong as animation director. Also, another master
Stop Motion artist-practioner but lesser known
to the public, Barry Purves was initially hired by Peter Jackson to do
some kind of work on Kong project and he spent many
months in New Zealand but he also was just nixed/
let go from Kong. Well .... here is the
juicy unconfirmed news:
Eric Leighton might be traveling to Weta Studios
in New Zealand to work on King Kong.
I think he might be doing stint as Animation
Director, maybe a replacement for
Randy.
Eric's roots are in Stop Motion and I
remember his early beginnings at Gumby's New Adventures TV show ....pushing clay around in
the San Francisco bay area at Premavision studio..
His big, last mainstream project that I know of, was as co-director
of the CGI Dinosaur animated movie for Disney.
Since then, we have not heard much from Eric except the
on & off Astro Boy movie that has been reported, he will
direct.
____________________
Special Weekend Edition - 06.19.04
* Why can't we have something like
this....Museum Brings Hollywood to Chicago ...... in California? The supposed mecca of
Special Effects here .... ILM, Pixar,
PDI, Tippett Studio, Hollywood, etc.. I have to
go to Chicago to see a cool
museum about Moviemaking-Special Effects?? Seems
like we should have a permanent
attraction covering the history & state of the art of
Special Effects here on the West Coast, perhaps
with the help of a little $donation
contributions$ from a few of the studios
making the mega million dollars from the blockbuster hits
.... giving something back
....for public education about the Moviemaking
FX industry (perhaps tax deductable for
studios?) Anyway, if you live near Chicago or will be
travelling there ..... you are lucky
....
The Museum of Science &
Industry
____________________
06.16.04
* Here is a great little audio
segment from National Public Radio (NPR) spotlighting Ray
Harryhausen. About 6 minutes of streaming audio
and you can use RealAudio player or Windows Media player
(I think is better). As you may already know, Uncle Ray
has always had mixed feelings about Cgi,
and you might think that he is just stubborn, nostalgic
or old fashioned. I think, to the contrary
and I agree with some of Ray's observations ....
Everything is just tooooo fast paced
these days with MTV-like, quick edit-cuts, visual
gimmicks, etc., at the expense of good storytelling.
____________________
Special Weekend
Edition - 06.12.04
* If you are new to my periodic
whinings, grumblings & rants. I need to ocassionally
remind visitors, to NOT misinterpret my position
or not to catergorize me as a
"hater" of all this pixel digital imaging
technology. I have nothing against CGI &
computer technology as an additional tool for the
artist-filmmaker. As I said below in my previous
commentary .... it is when Cgi is starting to be
used as a crutch in lieu of good stories or characters
and also the Cgi technique is excluding other kinds of
"visual styles". Did
you know, the just released Garfield movie
did not get that many positive reviews?
See 1-
2-
3-
4 . I can guess the thinking behind the
"suits" ..... they possibly said in their
production-board meetings ...."If Scooby Doo can
be turned into Cgi let's copy them and we will do it with
Garfield!....."Cgi will guarantee it to be a
blockbuster hit!" I made-up that scenario but
you can see how pretty stupid & myopic the mainstream
movie biz studio suits/producers, are. They seem to have
no concern for quality and the pattern seems to be
heading towards, pumping out quantities of pablum.
All formulaic and no originality. Also, notice the new
fad or trend towards re-makes of previous movies? You
see, I am not the only one with these observations and I
saw it coming awhile ago ..... all this computer
digital-pixel mania. Here is somebody else's
commentary who similarly thinks the same Wizards with No Soul
____________________
06.09.04
* Revolution Threatens Puppet Regimes is an article about how digital
pixels have invaded the domain of puppetry &
animatronics. IMO, mainstream biz perhaps over relying on
CGI to purely sythensize all the visual imagery. As the
mainstream market is getting flooded
with all the Nemo or Shrek, Spiderman, etc.
wannabies, audiences maybe are getting jaded to
the homogenized looking products. Maybe there will be a
glimmer of hope .... some directors on
low budget features, are cleverly mixing-up the
techniques.... traditional methods combined with
pixel image generation. I think this adds more texture
and depth to the images .....using Cgi as
flavorings and as a tool-aid
and not as a crutch. Of
course, the "suits" do not give a rat's pink
butt about the subtlties of how the images are made. It
is only $$$$ to them. "They" will run
Cgi into the ground until it no longer attracts the
audiences (cgi overdose). As the ol' saying goes, perhaps
one day, "What is old (traditional) may become
new". Just a side note ....the upcoming Alien vs. Predator ... I have read comments by the
director, Paul Anderson, that he
intentionally used more puppetry and animatronics, and
kept the Cgi only to a minimum
where absolutely necessary.
* News is, that Henry Selick
(Nightmare Before Christmas) will be working for Vinton
Studios. It is not Stop Motion
project and will be Cgi. Not much I can
say and I suppose, that one needs to "pay the rent
and bills" and hence, one must give in
the the Dark "pixel digital" Side.
 Selick Joins Vinton Studios
____________________
06.04.04
* Continuing with the previous
mention of Master Phil Tippett here....
it seems there is a little more exposure on the internet
about Phil because of the just released ST 2.
Anyway, I just found this nice article giving a brief
retrospective of Phil starting from his Star Wars
days, to the present, with some brief soundbytes
regarding his recent directorial debut and his other
insightful observations. Enjoy, Phil Tippett: Hands-On Effects
* With
many interviews that Ray Harryhausen
gives and especially now, with his more frequent tours
promoting his book An Animated Life, some of the brief articles about
him are kind of repetitive but I found a quickie book
review by James Adams which I thought, he was pretty good
in extracting the essence of Ray and the impact of his
pioneering work on the current CGI & Special Effects
over-abundance. I like this quote from Ray and Jame's
commentary throughout article.....
"Unsurprisingly, he has a
jaundiced view of contemporary filmmaking's fondness for
CGI. "It's a wonderful tool, certainly," he
averred, "but I don't think everything else should
be discarded just because you have that. I mean, Kermit
brought back the potency of the hand-puppet.
Nick Park showed the vibrancy
of stop-motion animation with Chicken Run."Here
is the article Ray, Fay Wray and destiny
____________________
06.01.04
* Well
.... this is not about Stop Motion specifically, but a
brief mention about Phil Tippett and his
venture as Director of the just
released, direct to DVD movie, Starship Troopers 2. Always great to hear
Tippett's past cogent observations about the biz.
In other articles & interviews, Phil has
usually commented about the reality and insanity of the
special FX field ....the ridiculous demands by
the studio suits and of course, all very rushed scheduled
and they want it done cheap. Others in the
special effects field are usually quiet about
this but Phil has the chutzpah to say the truth!
If there was any mainstream market for Stop Motion, Phil
perhaps might still be doing it today. I always get the
feeling he is somewhat relunctantly doing the CGI stuff
because he was forced to. Redford, Tippett & Monsters, Tippett Talks Troopers 2
|
|
